He Left a Clean Camp Site: Gordon Lightfoot is Dead… at 84! (How’d He Get to be so Old?!) Read His Obits, See a Documentary on His Life, a Video Obit, and Listen to His Three Greatest Songs! (Videos, Videos, Videos!)

By Grand Rapids Anonymous, Jerry PDX, and N.S.

Gordon Lightfoot—a Hit Machine in the 70s—Succumbs to being 84

tuesday, may 2, 2023 at 6:04:00 a.m. edt

“(cnn) Gordon Lightfoot, the Canadian singer-songwriter whose enduring folk hits included ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’ and ‘Sundown,’ died Monday, his spokesperson told cnn. He was 84.

“Lightfoot died of natural causes at 7:30 p.m. at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, spokesperson Victoria Lord said.

“His death comes less than a month after he canceled his 2023 U.S. and Canada concert schedule on April 11. That cancellation was due to ‘health related issues’ according to a facebook post.

[GRA: Do you think there was a connection? Stupid writing.)

“Lightfoot found success on the U.S. pop charts in 1970 with the song, ‘If You Could Read My Mind.’ That track also earned the artist his second of four Grammy nominations, that one for best male pop vocal performance.

“His 1976 ballad about the sinking of a Great Lakes cargo ship, ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,’ reached No. 2 on the Billboard charts. Other hits included ‘Carefree Highway’ and ‘Sundown.’”

--GRA

Jerry PDX: The great Gordon Lightfoot has died at age 84:

wednesday, may 3, 2023 at 12:48:00 a.m. edt

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/gordon-lightfoot-dead-obituary-1234716529/

Sad day, always loved his music. My first introduction to Lightfoot was Gord’s Gold, his double greatest hits album, which I played over and over, back in the day. Songs like “If You Could Read My Mind,” “Carefree Highway,” “Early Morning Rain,” “Cotton Jenny”… many others. He was a genius-level songwriter, and along with Neil Young and Joni Mitchell, part of the holy trinity of Canadian songwriters. He will be missed.

By Grand Rapids Anonymous
wednesday, may 3, 2023 at 7:03:00 a.m. edt

Yes, I posted an obit also, Jerry. A wonderful time to listen to the radio.

In my experience, one can only know how great a person’s talent is—or his songs are—is in retrospect—many years down the road. At that time, just hearing them on a day-to-day basis, you assumed we’d hear these quality songs forever—but it wasn’t the correct assumption, of course. By 1977, disco was in full mode. There were scattered talents in the 80s—like John Mellencamp and Nirvana in the 90s, but basically the talent disappeared, and/or the times had changed. Lightfoot was only heard from in oldies concerts and oldies radio.

For a short while though, it was a blast—wasn’t it—to listen to music on your transistor radio or $100 record player.

--GRA

Folk singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot dies at 84 (nbc news center maine)



16x9: “Folk Hero: Story of Gordon Lightfoot”

The tv newsmagazine 16x9 is the Canadian 60 Minutes. Liza Fromer interviewed Lightfoot, circa 2012, when he was 73.



(All of the following songs have words and music by Gordon Lightfoot)

“If You Could Read My Mind” (1971)

If you could read my mind, love,
What a tale my thoughts could tell,
Just like an old-time movie,
‘Bout a ghost from a wishing well.

In a castle dark,
Or a fortress strong,
With chains upon my feet,
You know that ghost is me.

And I will never be set free,
As long as I’m a ghost,
that you can’t see.

If I could read your mind, love,
What a tale your thoughts could tell,
Just like a paperback novel,
The kind the drugstore sells.

When you reach the part where the heartaches come,
The hero would be me, but heroes often fail,
And you won’t read that book again,
Because the ending’s just too hard to take.

I’d walk away, like a movie star,
Who gets burned in a three-way script,
And enters number two,
A movie queen to play the scene,
Of bringing all the good things out in me,
But for now, love, let’s be real.

I never thought I could act this way,
And I’ve got to say that I just don’t get it,
I don’t know where we went wrong,
But the feeling’s gone,
And I just can’t get it back.

If you could read my mind, love,
What a tale my thoughts could tell,
Just like an old-time movie,
‘Bout a ghost from a wishing well.

In a castle dark,
Or a fortress strong,
With chains upon my feet,
But stories always end.

And if you read between the lines,
You’ll know that I’m just
Trying to understand,
The feelings that you lack.

I never thought I could feel this way,
And I’ve got to say that I just don’t get it,
I don’t know where we went wrong,
But the feeling’s gone,
And I just can’t get it back.

A youtube commenter said this song was about the dissolution of Lightfoot’s second marriage, to the former Brita Olaisson, the mother of his first two children. They married in 1963; their divorce was finalized in 1973.




“In the Early Morning Rain” (1967)

In the early morning rain,
With a dollar in my hand,
With an aching in my heart,
And my pockets full of sand.

I’m a long way from home,
Lord, I miss my loved ones so,
In the early morning rain,
With no place to go.

Out on runway number nine,
A big 707 set to go,
And, I’m stuck here in the grass,
Where the pavement never grows.

Now, the liquor tasted good,
And the women all were fast,
Well, there she goes, my friend,
She’ll be rolling down, at last.

Hear the mighty engines roar,
See the silver wing on high,
She’s away and westward bound,
Far above the clouds she’ll fly.

There the morning rain don’t fall,
And the sun always shines,
She’ll be flying over my home,
In about three hours time.

This old airport’s got me down,
It’s no earthly good to me,
And I’m stuck here on the ground,
As cold and drunk as I can be.

You can’t jump a jet plane,
Like you can a freight train,
So, I’d best be on my way,
In the early morning rain.

You can’t jump a jet plane,
Like you can a freight train,
So, I’d best be on my way,
In the early morning rain.





“The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”

“The Edmund Fitzgerald tragedy took place” on November 10, 1975, in Lake Superior. One year later, Lightfoot came out with his song commemorating the disaster, which claimed 29 lives (the captain and the entire crew). According to imdb.com, Lightfoot frequently sang “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” at the annual Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial Service at Mariner’s Church in Detroit for the lost. The “song hit #2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 pop chart.”

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down,
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee,
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead,
When the skies of November turn gloomy.

With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more,
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty,
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed,
When the gales of November came early.

The ship was the pride of the American side,
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin,
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well seasoned.

Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms,
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland,
And later that night when the ship’s bell rang,
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin’?

The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound,
And a wave broke over the railing,
And every man knew, as the captain did, too,
T’was the witch of November come stealin.’

The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait,
When the gales of November came slashin,’
When afternoon came it was freezin’ rain,
In the face of a hurricane west wind.

When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin,’
“Fellas, it’s too rough to feed ya,”
At seven p.m., a main hatchway caved in, he said,
“Fellas, it’s been good to know ya.”

The captain wired in, he had water comin’ in,
And the good ship and crew was in peril,
And later that night when his lights went outta sight,
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

Does any one know where the love of God goes,
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they’d have made Whitefish Bay,
If they’d put fifteen more miles behind her.

They might have split up or they might have capsized,
They may have broke deep and took water,
And all that remains is the faces and the names,
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters.

Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings,
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion,
Old Michigan steams like a young man’s dreams
The islands and bays are for sportsmen.

And farther below Lake Ontario,
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her,
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know,
With the gales of November remembered.

In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed,
In the maritime sailors’ cathedral,
The church bell chimed ‘til it rang twenty-nine times,
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald.

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down,
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee,
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead,
When the gales of November come early.

N.S.: When I read those words, I get the feeling I got from watching the late Wolfgang Petersen (1941-2022) and Sebastian Junger’s movie, The Perfect Storm.